Wednesday, October 2, 2013

Lessons

I will be at General Conference this week Saturday night -- not the Priesthood Session. So look for me. I will be in the back because those are the only tickets that we were able to get. :)

We baptized a boy named Quincy this last Saturday. He was one of the smartest 9 year old boys that I know. We gave him a Book of Mormon Story book to read and he finished it within 4 days. Then we gave him the Old Testament Story book and he finished that as well really fast. Finally we told him to just read the Book of Mormon and he is now in 2 Nephi and when we asked his favorite part he told us, "I like the part when he gets tied up on the boat and his brothers are being really mean to him, but then God loved Nephi so he caused the bothers to let him go." I love that kid. His Mom is not returning back to church and his whole family came up here for the baptism. They are not all members including her husband. We also taught the Restoration while they were changing after the baptism. (Ben is that something that you were asked to do by your mission president? Because that is what our mission president told us to do). Something that made it really good was my companion played the piano while I was giving the first vision. It was really good and you could feel the Holy Ghost really strong there.

There is already snow!

I was also asked to give the talk on the Holy Ghost at the baptism and I also had about 2 min to think about what I was going to say. I believe that I did a really good job. I had lots of people say that I did a good job. I like it when time does not matter and you just move as the Spirit directs. (That is one of the reasons that my role plays and or talks in sacrament meeting don't feel genuine because I am always rushed for time or feel like I have to fill the whole time.)

Robert I agree that lots of the questions that are asked in the church can be answered with "The Atonement." I remember when I was your age we had what we called SMA or Standard Mormon Answers. You could answer any question with the same answer, but that led me down the path that I thought I knew most everything. So just remember that there is so much more you can learn, even from the lesson that they teach over and over and you feel like you have the lesson memorized. There is still more you can learn.

Also, yesterday was the 5th Sunday and I went to the combined class at the end of church. One of our bishops taught. He talked about video games. He went through some video games and was very blunt about what they do in the video game. For example, Grand Theft Auto: he said that this is one of the most common games in the world. This game is a really bad game. He said that first off you are the criminal and never the good guy. You go around killing people, cops, and stealing things. The more cops you kill, the more destruction you make, and the more people you steal from, the more money you make. And what you do with the money is worse. You go and sleep with a prostitute and then you have the option to kill her and get your money back. And it goes on.

Now this was not the worst game he mentioned but is is one of the most popular games and it is only rated M for mature. There is only one higher and that is only because they add in gambling games. The bishop told this to all of the adults to warn them that the world is changing. They are in games that any kid can go to the store and buy. There are horrible things that are out there in members homes and corrupting people and people lose the Holy Ghost when they play these games. Read Deuteronomy 11:26-28: things are given for a reason, but Satan changes those things and makes it bad.

Elder Joshua Walker

The Missionary

About Elder Walker

Elder Joshua Walker is serving in the Utah Salt Lake City South Mission (English speaking) for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints from January 2013 - January 2015. He's from Modesto, CA and studied at BYU-Idaho.

The Utah Salt Lake City South Mission

Utah Salt Lake City South Mission Website

The Utah Salt Lake City South Mission has a website here that has pictures of the mission. Keep your eyes open for Elder Walker when he's in the field!